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frenzy.
    He couldn’t get the number six out of his head. Fife C.I.D. had revisited the bird sanctuary that morning, but had nothing else to report except for the fact that “a man from the papers” had been sniffing around earlier—the story was going to hit the headlines soon enough.
    Which was why he was now in the squad car—in the passenger seat having let Simpson take the driving duties again—inching their way through heavy traffic up the Mound towards the castle esplanade.
    “There’s no report of any blood or feathers, boss,” Simpson said. “I don’t think this is our man.”
    “Let’s hope not,” he replied, and fought off the urge to roll down his window and curse at the clearly lost driver of the car in front of them.
    It took them another ten minutes to get to the top end of the Royal Mile and that only brought them to the tail of a snaking queue of coaches waiting to get onto the castle esplanade. By that time Grainger was ready to hit something—or someone.
    “That’s enough,” Grainger said. “Park it anywhere you can. We’ll walk up. I need the air anyway.”
    Simpson obliged. They left the squad car and went up the last stretch on foot, giving Grainger plenty of time for a smoke—and a good look at the chaos around the castle entrance. Two officers had stopped anyone getting in or out. Coaches, drivers, tour guides and tourists were all shouting from both sides of a makeshift barricade.
    Amid all the noise a thin, well-dressed woman stood to one side, weeping silently into a handkerchief.
    Grainger went straight to her.
    “When did you last see your daughter?” he said.
    The woman stiffened at the sight of him, as if recognizing authority.
    “Up near the gun battery,” she said. “We were waiting for the one o’ clock salute and when I turned round she was gone and…”
    That was all she could manage. The tears started again—too many for Grainger to cope with.
    “Get her away from here and find somebody to look after her,” he said to Simpson. “And get some more bodies out and about. Find that wee lass, before this turns into another media scrum.”
    He left Simpson to it and walked up into the castle proper. He had to show his badge to the guards at the main gate, and he asked then if they’d seen a girl in distress. He got nowhere fast.
    “I see far too many kids on this duty, sir,” the young guard said. “Dancing about, prodding us, trying to look up the kilt, and making faces to get us to smile. I stopped paying attention to any of them months ago.”
    On his way up the steep walk to the main body of the castle he saw three uniformed officers questioning the crowd, letting them move down to the esplanade after talking to them. There was more of a semblance of order up here—at least someone had done a job properly.
    The scene around the guns was the same as it ever was—tourists snapping photos of bored soldiers who, like the guards down below, were forced to stand to attention and suffer as idiots shouted at them. The reek of cheap perfume and suntan lotion was enough to make Grainger consider lighting up another smoke, but a squeal from the parapets quickly put paid to that.
    “There’s sumfink dead down there,” a London voice shouted. Grainger was close enough to be one of the first people on the scene. He leaned over the parapet and looked down onto the small cemetery that was reserved for the army dogs that worked and died here in the castle. Something black lay among the now bloodstained stones, and he didn’t have to look too hard to know what it was.
    They had another brutalized swan—and another missing girl.
    * * *
    “Look, somebody had to have seen something,” Grainger said. “Find them.”
    They were back in the office. Two hours had passed since they left the castle, and they were no further forward. They couldn’t find a single witness who had seen the girl after she let go of her mother’s hand. None of the soldiers on duty had anything